MAN-O-MAN-O-MAN 
At last we can dispense with one of the silliest themes in all of sports. The Red Sox were “cursed” for many years, cursed with incompetent/drunk/racist management and inadequate pitching. The new ownership finally fixed that.
But today: “IN YOUR FACE, FLANDERS! WOOHOO!”
Wow. Just, WOW. Don’t pinch me; I don’t want to wake up from whatever this is (I’m barely conscious anyway…long night :D).
P.S. Not that I’m complaining, but what in the Hell happened to St. Louis? I mean, I was really nervous going in, perhaps more than I should have been; but to see them just shut out and crushed like that was wickid bizzah.
Yay. The most insufferable and annoying fans in all of sports got to see their team win a championship.
Now they’ll only become more arrogant, annoying and insufferable. Red Sox fans are the only fans in sports worse than Yankees fans.
I find any talk of ______ fans being ______ to be rather juvenile. Any ballpark full of random people will have some good guys, some bad guys, and a great many OK guys.
Okay BoSox fans. I was happy for you when you took out the evil empire of the Yanks. But I can’t share in your joy in taking out the Cards.
You are after all “evil empire #2”.
With your $127m salary being outdone by the Yanks $184m you are still $27m ahead of the next team. And the Cards were way back in the 9th spot at $83m.
Underdogs to the Yanks, okay.
But after they were gone you took their place of “The Almighty Dollar” rules baseball.
-disgruntled Brewers fan ($27m)
Oh, we can be insufferable, but it’s a product of PAIN. The Sox have rarely been among the worst teams; very frequently, they’ve been among the best. They have repeatedly built our hopes up to yet another great high, only crash and burn in what have been some of the more spectacular meltdowns in baseball history. As I wrote in an earlier post, the '86 world series was…just…awful. To this day (well, maybe not after today), with some people, you cannot even broach the subject of that year of infamy. It’s like some dreadfully shameful family secret one dare not speak of even in the closest company. Again and again the Sox have dangled the promise of victory in front of us only to snatch it back, rape us with the carrot, and beat us senseless with the stick. This pathological, almost schizophrenic hopeful defeatism has been etched into the New England psyche with chronic and merciless trauma.
To have it vanish in a historic four-game rally against the hated Yankees, followed by an equally history historic four-game shut-out in the series, capping off a record-breaking 8-game post-season streak…it’s…surreal doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s just…bizzahh! 
And just how many other teams have swept EIGHT GAMES in post-season play?
I believe exactly zero.
You have to remember that until recently, the league championship series were best-of-five, and for much of baseball history there were no league championship series at all, the team with the best record simply won the pennant. Eight game winning streaks have only been possible for about 10 years.
Wow. Ok, I’m going to point you in this direction, in this direction, and in this direction.
And perhaps here.
For clarification:
I used these teams because they have been around for a relatively short period of time.
It was a bright and cheerful night.
Over a New England corn field, a full moon rose, illuminating a field of blasted-looking stalks where once there had been corn. It was silent, save for the occasional rustling of a dried stalk on a cool night breeze.
Shortly after moonrise, 86 figures, shrouded from head to toe in black, except for their socks, which were a baleful shade of red, appeared silently from the periphery, forming a circle.
A little while later a truck pulled up, and out of its back was pulled a large strawman in the shape of a Cleveland shipbuilder. The black-hooded circle parted, and it was placed in the center of the cornfield, and torches were lit around it, and one man from the truck stayed in the center, and the circle of black closed around it. Then the truck left.
Still later, but while the moon was still full, 86 white limos drove up bearing 86 virgin maidens, shrouded in white, except for their socks, which were a baleful shade of red. They entered the circle and faced their black-hooded counterparts.
At the moment the lunar eclipse began, the shrouds fell to the ground, revealing, on the black side, 80 men, all warlocks, and 6 witches, for those maidens who had stated a preference for same, of course. The man in the center lit the strawman, starting a large fire that illuminated the entire cornfield. A great cry went up, and then there was the sound of many bodies falling to the ground, and much grinding and groaning. The sacrifice of the virgins had commenced. In many places, a red-socked beast with two backs appeared, in others far more, um, imaginative red-socked beasts. At the moment the lunar eclipse became full, a great groaning was heard. Then the beasts departed. The sacrifice was done.
172 sighs were heard. Then there was the sound of bodies arising, shrouds being donned, and people walking back to the limos, where TV’s were turned on to the World Series, and champagne bottles uncorked. At more or less midnight, or the Witching Hour (Eastern time, natch), the strawman collapsed in a burning heap, Boston won, and much rejoicing commenced.
Bullshit. Fans of any Philadelphia sports team are the worst anywhere (and I must begrudingly include myself among their number). Remember: Eagles fans are the ones who threw iceballs at Santa Claus.
Oh, and High Cheese? Bite me. I’ll accept that I have been whooshed (not the first time), but I am not the only person who misread your comments (see dougie_monty’s comments as well - looks like he took you at least semi-seriously as well). Generally speaking, if you have to explain the joke, it didn’t work.
Maybe, but at least they don’t act like martyred twats on the national stage. Sox fans are so freaking self-righteous, like being a Sox fan makes them a better fan.
Buncha tools.
High Cheese, I would like to apologize for this part of my post. It was unnecessarily snarky and I’m sorry. You whooshed me. Didn’t mean to be such a jackass. (Note To Myself: Eight prime-time baseball games in 10 days is too many. Get some sleep!)
Anyway … in “defense” of Philadelphia sports fans, they actually DO act like twats. We’re just in Philly, so nobody cares. You should hear the bitching going on around me about Terry Francona and how much he sucked when he was here and whaaaaaaaaaaaaa why can’t we win something once in a while? It’s quite embarrassing, really.
Somebody’s jealous!
I don’t get this at all. Whiney? Yes. Absurdly hopeful yet paradoxically knee-jerk pessimists? Absolutely. Drunken idiots? Plenty. Self-pitying? No question at all. But self-righteous? Martyred? Chronically disappointed and depressed, assuredly, even paranoid about “curses”. But I don’t know where this perception of holier-than-thou comes from. Most of the Boston fans truly love the sport and the team; they love Fenway, too, and I think something about that dinosaur of a park maintains a very organic connection to some of the old Boston heroes, like (in no particular order or with hope of being comprehensive) Yaz, Fisk, Parnell, Rice, Evans, and the immortal Ted Williams. It’s an historic team who essentially plays in a museum and shrine to those memories, both the pleasant and the bitter. For me as a 14-year-old, to see my first game in Fenway was almost spiritual; and I felt truly morose after '86. Having attended a few games in the Fleet Center (and missing the Garden as a result), I hope they never tear Fenway down.
Ha!
Not really, my team won two years ago so no sour grapes from me. The Sox thoroughly outplayed the Angels in the playoffs and completely deserved to win that series. The Sox deserved to win the World Series as it was obvious from mid-September that they were going to be the most complete team in the playoffs. I was pretty darn stunned that they went down 3-0 against the Yankees.
My hat’s off to the Red Sox. Epstein put a great team together and they played like one.
Yep, self-righteous and martyred.
The perception comes from the fact that I’ve never attended a game with a Red Sox fan without listening to them make snarky comments about why this stadium isn’t as good as Fenway, or how the fans of the other team aren’t as good because they don’t do this or that in Fenway, or how fans of the other team don’t know baseball as well as a Red Sox fan because they don’t do things just like they do in Fenway, or why Red Sox fans are better than fans of any other team because they’ve stuck with their team even though they haven’t won in so long, and on and on and on and on…
Feh…what the hell’s with the Card fans…the sky should have been filled with beer bottles, aimed at the celebration on the field…
ooh, wait…that’s the Yankee fan in me…sorry.
Watch for Pedro and Lowe wearing pinstripes next season.
and , grrrrrrr…congrats to the SOX.